DENTAL AMALGAM MERCURY SOLUTIONS www.dams.cc
DAMS 12164 Whitehouse Rd Tallahassee, Fl 32317
THE ENVIRONMENTAL EFFECTS
OF AMALGAM FILLINGS AFFECT EVERYONE
THE FOLLOWING FINDINGS ARE
DOCUMENTED IN THIS Review Paper:
1. Human
excretion into sewers by those with amalgam dental fillings along with
dental office amalgam waste have been
documented to be the largest source of mercury into sewers and septic tanks.
2. All sewer plants in the U.S. have high
levels of mercury and all sewer sludge has dangerous levels of mercury (generally 1 to 3 ppm).
3. Dental amalgam fillings are a major source of
mercury going into rivers, lakes, and
bays, both from dental offices and human wastes in home and office sewers.
Dentistry is the third largest use of mercury in the U.S. using 45 tons
per year most of which ends up in the environment.
4. Mercury pollution is
widespread in U.S. rivers, lakes, and bays; with dangerous amounts of mercury commonly found in
freshwater and saltwater fish. Over 50% of Florida’s rivers and lakes have
warnings regarding eating the fish and
most bays. Over 33% of all U.S.
lakes have fish consumption warnings, 15% of all U.S. river miles, 90% of
Atlantic coastal miles, and 100% of all Gulf coastal miles. Most Gulf Coast salt water predator fish
species have high
levels of mercury(above EPA/FDA warning level)
5. Mercury is the most
toxic substance commonly encountered, and is adversely affecting the health of millions of
people in the U.S.
6. If sewer sludge is
incinerated, most of the mercury goes into emissions.
7. Crops grown on land
using sewer sludge pick up high levels of mercury. Soil bacteria in landfills and land spread
sludge areas methylate mercury to methyl mercury,
which is released in methane and landfill gas in high levels.
High levels of mercury are being found in rain all over the U.S.
8. Dental Amalgam
fillings are the number one source of mercury in most people and levels of mercury exposure from
amalgam commonly exceeds Government
Health Guidelines, with high levels in human excretion wastes documented.
9. The level of mercury in all sewer plants in the U.S. exceeds
the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency(EPA’s)
proposed mercury limit for mercury in water due to the large amount from
amalgam in sewers from dental offices, homes, and businesses.
10. Crematoria emissions commonly violate mercury air emission
standards and are a significant source of mercury emissions due to mercury in
amalgam fillings. Amalgam related air
emissions exceed coal plant emissions in UK.
11. Due to the high mercury releases from dental offices, most
European countries require amalgam separators in dental offices but the U.S.
still has no regulations on this source of mercury. Due to the major environmental effects of
mercury from amalgam fillings, plus the additional known adverse health
effects, most Japanese Dental Schools no longer teach the use of mercury
amalgam fillings and several other countries have voted to ban amalgam use or
issued warnings regarding its use, as have several U.S. states.
Documentation:
Mercury is one of the most toxic
substances commonly encountered, and according to Government agencies causes
adverse health effects in large numbers of people in the U.S.[1,20] The extreme toxicity of mercury can be seen
from documented effects on wildlife by very low levels of mercury exposure. The
amount of mercury in the marine environment is increasing 4.8% per year,
doubling every 16 years(16). Some Florida panthers that eat birds and
animals that eat fish containing very low levels of mercury(about
1 part per million) have died from chronic mercury poisoning(17). Since mercury is an estrogenic chemical and
reproductive toxin, the majority of the rest cannot reproduce. The average male Florida panther has higher
estrogen levels than females, due to the
estrogenic properties of mercury(17).Similar is true of some other animals at
the top of the food chain like polar bears, beluga whales, and alligators,
which are affected by mercury and other hormone disrupting chemicals. Mercury in whalemeat
has been found to be high enough to cause acute toxicity from one meal. Several
liver samples contained over 1000 ppm mercury, over
2000 times the Japanese health standard.
Muscle samples contained 2.5 to 25 times the health standard(25). The Japanese government's limit for
mercury contamination, 0.4 micrograms per gram(25). According to the U.S. EPA, the maximum
advisable concentration of methylmercury in fish and
shellfish tissue to protect consumers among the general population is 0.3 ppm(25b).
Several European countries including Sweden have banned use of amalgam
fillings, with the environmental releases being a major factor(5b).
Mercury has been found to be so toxic
that the drinking water standard for mercury is 2 parts per billion(ppb). But U.S. EPA have found that because mercury bioaccumulates in the environment and fish, in order to
protect from accumulation in fish and wildlife and human health even lower
standards appear to be needed and lower standards have been proposed or adopted
in many areas(14). The Great Lakes
Initiative Wildlife Criteria calculated needed to prevent accumulation in fish
and wildlife is 1.3 nanagrams per Liter(ng/L) while the GLI Human Health Criteria is 3.1 ng/L(parts per trillion). The EPA Fish Tissue Methyl
Mercury-based Criteria for rivers is 7.8 ng/L
and for lakes is 3.5 ng/L. The California Toxics Rule
Saltwater Criteria is 25 ng/L(14). The EEU limit on mercury in sewers is 50
micrograms per liter(31).
The average amalgam filling has more than
˝ gram of mercury, and has been documented to continuously leak mercury into
the body of those with amalgam fillings due to the low mercury vapor pressure
and galvanic current induced by mixed metals in the mouth(20). Amalgam has been well documented to be the
number one source of mercury in most people(19,20) and
to commonly cause serious adverse health effects(20). Amalgam has also been documented to be the
largest source of methyl mercury in most people, since mercury vapor and
inorganic mercury have been shown to be methylated
to methyl mercury in the mouth and intestines by bacteria, yeasts and other
methyl donors(20). Mercury has also been
found to be methylated in dental office disposal and
sewer systems at levels orders of magnitude higher than in lakes and rain(4d).
Because of the extreme toxicity of mercury,
only ˝ gram is required to contaminate the ecosystem and fish of a 10 acre lake
to the extent that a health warning would be issued by the government to not
eat the fish[2].
Over half the rivers and lakes along with most bays in Florida have such health
warnings(3) banning or limiting eating
of fish, and most other states and 4 Canadian provinces have similar health warnings(16,29). Wisconsin has fish consumption warnings for
over 250 lakes and rivers(5b) and Minnesota even more, as part of the total of
over 50,000 such lakes with warnings(16)(over 33% of all significant U.S.
lakes) and 15% of all U.S. river miles.
All Great Lakes as
well as most coastal bays and estuaries and large numbers of salt water fish
carry similar health warnings, with 90% of Atlantic coastal miles and 100% of
Gulf coastal miles covered by fish mercury warnings.
Nationwide the dental industry is the third
largest user of mercury, using over 45 tons of mercury per year(26,14),
and most of this mercury eventually ends up in the environment. Amalgam from dental offices is by far the
largest contributor of mercury(over 35% of total) into
sewers and sewer plants(4,13b,14,26), with mercury from replaced amalgam
fillings and crown bases the largest source. When amalgam fillings are removed
by standard practice methods using primary and secondary solids collectors,
approximately 60% of the amalgam metals by weight end up in sewer effluent(28b). As much as 10% of prepared new amalgam
becomes waste. This mercury also accumulates in building sewer pipes and septic
tanks or drain fields where used, creating toxic liabilities. Unlike Canada and most European countries such as Germany,
Sweden, Switzerland, and Denmark which
have much more stringent regulation of mercury that requires amalgam separators
in dental offices(26,28,22), the U.S. does not and most dental offices do not
have them. The discharge into sewers at
a dental office per dentist using amalgam without amalgam separators is between
56 milligrams per day(14) and 270 milligrams per
day(4,14,26). (some studies found much higher levels
for some offices) For the U.S. with approximately 170,000 dentists working with
amalgam(26),
this would be from 2500 kg/yr to 12,000 kg/yr (between 3 to 13 tons/year
of mercury into sewers and thus into streams, lakes, bays, and sewer
sludge. In Canada the annual amount
discharged is about 2 tons per year(28), with portions
ending up in waters/fish, some in landfills and cropland, and in air emissions.
The recently enacted regulations on dental office waste in Canada are expected
to reduce emissions by at least 63% by 2005, compared to 2000(28).
Studies in Michigan, California, and
Washington estimated that dental mercury is responsible for approximately 12 to14
% of mercury discharged to streams (5). An EPA study(13)
found that dental office waste were responsible for similar levels of mercury
in lakes, bays, and streams in other areas throughout the U.S. A Canadian study found similar levels of
mercury contribution from dental offices into lakes and streams, and surveys of
dental office disposal practices found the majority violated disposal
regulations, and dangerous levels of mercury are accumulating in pipes and
septic tanks from many offices(14,21,26). Dental
amalgam mercury has been documented to be highly bioavailable
in water(30).
The total discharge into sewers from
dental amalgam at individual homes and businesses
is
second only to that from dental offices(14), since the average person with amalgam fillings excretes in body waste
approximately 40 micrograms per day of
mercury(6,7,8,20,31a). This has also been confirmed by medical labs(13c), such as Doctors Data Lab in Chicago and Biospectron in Sweden, which do thousands of stool tests
per year and is consistent with studies measuring levels in residential sewers
by municipalities(13b). In a Finnish
study, over 20 % of those with amalgam excrete so much to home sewers that the
EEU standard for mercury in sewers(50 ug/L) is
exceeded(31). The amount of mercury excreted on average doubled for each
additional 10 amalgam surfaces. The
AMSA study adopted the conservative estimate of 28 micrograms per day for the
average person with amalgam and 17 micrograms for the average of all those with
and without amalgam. In the U.S. this
would amount to approximately 2800 to 5500 kilograms per year into sewers or
from 3 to 6 tons per year. Over 3 tons of mercury flows into the Chesapeake Bay
annually from sewer plants, with numerous resulting fish consumption advisories
for that area and similar for other areas(16). Thus the amount of mercury being excreted
from dental amalgam is more than enough to cause dangerous levels of mercury in
fish in most U.S. streams into which sewers empty. Studies by Oak Ridge National Laboratory(U.S. Dept. of Energy)(22,23) and other studies(14)
have confirmed high levels of mercury in sewers and sewer sludge(generally 1 to
3 ppm in biosolids). Publically Owned Treatment Works( POTWs) do not have equipment to remove mercury in sewers
other than any pretreatment requirements imposed by sewer districts. Mercury wastes are incompatible and must be
removed at the source. In general POTWs are not
equipped to remove or treat toxic chemicals.
MCES found that dental offices were
responsible for over 40% of Mineapolis sewer mercury
and excretion from those with amalgam responsible for over 80% of domestic
mercury(4). According to an EPA study
the majority of U.S. sewerage plants cannot meet the new EPA guideline for
mercury discharge into waterways that was designed to prevent bioaccumulation in
fish and wildlife due to household sewer mercury levels(15,13).
The EPA discharge rule had been reduced due to a National Academy of Sciences
report of July 2000 that found that even small levels of mercury in fish result
in unacceptable risks of birth defects and developmental effects in infants(18).
ORNL
studies have found that crops grown on land using land spread sewer sludge pick
up high levels of mercury, and soil bacteria methylate
inorganic mercury into methyl mercury, which is released into the air or
landfill gas at high levels(22,23a). Sixty percent of
the 5.6 million tons of sewage sludge generated each year are used for land application(27). The ORNL studies estimate that emissions of
mercury from sludge amended soil amounts to from 5 to 6 tons of mercury per year(23a). Most
dental amalgam waste from dental offices either goes into landfills or is incinerated(26).
Much of the sewer sludge is also incinerated. Most of the mercury in materials that are
incinerated goes out in the emissions, as most incinerators have no controls to
remove mercury. High levels of
mercury including the very toxic organic forms are being measured in rainfall
throughout the U.S.(24). High levels of the extremely toxic dimethyl and methylmercury forms
of mercury are being found in landfill gas coming from landfills and appear to
be a significant source of some of this(22,24). Bacteria in landfills have been found to be methylating elemental and inorganic mercury to the organic forms(22a,23a).
Dental amalgam waste and mercury from human sewer sludge are major
sources of mercury in some landfills and sludge is also used in landspreading on farms and other areas. Health Canada has also documented similar
information on mercury emissions from amalgam and sewer sludge to waterways,
crops, and air(28,29).
Additionally cremation of those with amalgam
fillings adds to air emissions and deposition onto land and lakes. A study in Switzerland found that in that
small country, cremation released over 65 kilograms of mercury per year as
emissions, often exceeding site air mercury standards(9), while another Swiss
study found mercury levels during cremation of a person with amalgam fillings
as high as 200 micrograms per cubic meter(considerably higher than U.S. mercury
standards). The amount of mercury in
the mouth of a person with fillings was on average 2.5 grams, enough to
contaminate 5 ten acre lakes to the extent there would be dangerous levels in fish(2,20). A
Japanese study estimated mercury emissions from a small crematorium there as 26
grams per day(10).
A study in Sweden found significant occupational and environmental
exposures at crematoria, and since the requirement to install selenium filters
mercury emission levels in crematoria have been reduced 85%(11). For the 70% of people in Britain who
die and end up with their bodies being cremated, the mercury escapes into the atmosphere and
contaminates waterways, soil, wildlife
and food. Crematoria now contribute 16% of all the mercury released by industry
and power
plants in Britain(32), with levels projected to soon exceed emissions by
power/industrial plants(32b). The 440,000 people cremated in Britain every year
are estimated to discharge 1300kg of mercury(12) A study of assessing hair mercury in a group
of staff at some of the 238 British crematoriums found that the groups hair
mercury were significantly greater than that of controls(12). Government guidance calls on them to introduce new flue cleaning
measures to help achieve a statutory target of a 50 per cent reduction by 2012.
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*********************************
Technical contact person: Bernard Windham
President
and Research Coordinator, DAMS
International
berniew1@embarqmail.com ph: 850-878-9024